BMW has unveiled the Concept X5 eDrive, which will be showcased at the New York International Auto Show. Although the vehicle is labeled as a concept, it’s a dead ringer for the production plug-in hybrid version of BMW’s popular crossover that it plans to bring to market sometime within the next year or two.

The hybrid drive system gets its primary motivation from a 245hp turbocharged 4-cylinder engine. That gas engine is combined with a 95hp/184 lb-ft electric motor developed by the BMW Group. Power for the electric motor comes from a lithium-ion battery pack (which is mounted under the cargo area) that can charge from any wall outlet.

The Concept X5 eDrive can drive on electricity alone for up to 20 miles at speeds up to 75 mph. BMW says that the car will have an average fuel consumption of over 74.3 mpg in the EU testing cycle (which means we’ll likely see less than half of that quoted figure under EPA guidelines). BMW says that the X5 concept can reach 62mph in under 7-seconds.

The Concept X5 eDrive is the first from BMW that uses its xDrive all-wheel-drive system paired with eDrive hybrid technology.

The concept also has a ConnectedDrive system that helps plan routes and lists the location of charging stations on the GPS map. This allows the driver to find a charging station when they are around town in electric mode.

The whole balance of trade situation could be to blame for the global financial crisis (GFC). The USA buys more goods from China than it sells to China. China winds up with a surplus of Trillions US dollars. China wants to put that money to work so it lends it back to the US. The banks are awash with cheap money that they need to lend out so they get reckless with their lending practices and a huge property bubble grows bigger and bigger over a few years. When the bubble bursts as all bubbles must at some point some banks fail others need rescuing and the whole financial system looks like it might collapse. So no one will lend to anyone else and now we have a credit squeeze and the GFC goes into overdrive. An enormous amount of wealth is destroyed around the world. The question I ask is what is different now?